The Wrecker by Clive Cussler (book club reads .TXT) 📕

“You bet. And the Pope just gave me a pass for the Pearly Gates.”

Bell pulled Osgood Hennessy’s letter from his wallet and thrust it in the dispatcher’s face.

“I want your fastest locomotive.”

The dispatcher read it twice, stood up, and said, “Yes, sir! But I’ve only got one engine, and she’s scheduled to hitch onto the westbound limited, which is due in twenty minutes.”

“Turn her around, we’re going east.”

“Where to?”

“After the Overland Limited.”

“You’ll never catch her.”

“If I don‘t, you’ll be hearing from Mr. Hennessy. Get on that telegraph and clear the tracks.”

The Overland Limited had a fifty-minute head start, but Bell’s locomotive had the advantage of hauling only the weight of her own coal and water while the Limited’s engine was towing eight Pullmans and baggage, dining, and observation cars. Hundred-dollar tips to the fireman and engineer didn’t hurt her speed either. They climbed through the night, encountering snow in the Medicine Bow Mountains, a harbinger of the winter that Osgood Hennessy’s railroad builders were striving to beat even as the Wrecker sowed death and destruction to stop them.

They left the snow behind as they descended into the Laramie Valley, stormed through it and the town, stopping only for water, and climbed again. They finally caught up with the Overland Limited east of Laramie at Buford Station, where the rising sun was illuminating the pink granite on the crest of Sherman Hill. The Limited was sidetracked on the water siding, her fireman wrestling the spigot down from the tall wooden tank and jerking the chain that caused the water to flow into the locomotive’s tender.

“Do you have sufficient water to make it to Cheyenne without stopping?” Bell asked his fireman.

“I believe so, Mr. Bell.”

“Pass him!” Bell told the engineer. “Take me straight to the Cheyenne Depot. Fast as you can.”

From Buford Station to Cheyenne, the road descended two thousand feet in thirty miles. With nothing on the eastbound track in front of Bell’s special, they headed for Cheyenne at ninety miles an hour.

19

THE WRECKER HAD AWAKENED THE INSTANT THE TRAIN HAD stopped. He parted the shade a crack and saw the sun shining on pink Sherman granite, which the railroad quarried for track ballast. They would be in Cheyenne for breakfast. He closed his eyes, glad for another hour of sleep.

A locomotive thundered past the sidetracked Limited.

The Wrecker opened his eyes. He rang for the porter.

“George,” he said to Jonathan. “Why have we stopped?”

“Stopped for water, suh.”

“Why did a train overtake us?”

“Don’t know, suh.”

“We are the Limited.”

“Yes, suh.”

“What train would be faster than this one, damn you?”

The porter flinched. Senator Kincaid’s face was suddenly wracked with rage, his eyes hot, his mouth twisted with hate. Jonathan was terrified. The Senator could order him fired in a breath. They’d throw him off the train at the next stop. Or right here on top of the Rocky Mountains. “It weren’t no train passing us, suh. It was just a locomotive all by hisself.”

“A single locomotive?”

“Yes, suh! Just him and his tender.”

“So it must have been a chartered special.”

“Must have been, suh. Just like you say, suh. Going lickety-split, suh.”

The Wrecker lay back on the bed, clasped his hands behind his head, and thought hard.

“Will there be anything else, suh?” Jonathan asked warily.

“Coffee.”

BELL’S CHARTERED LOCOMOTIVE RACED through Cheyenne’s stock-yards and into Union Depot shortly after nine in the morning. He ran directly to the Inter-Ocean Hotel, the best among the three-story establishments he could see from the station. The house detective took one look at the tall man in ripped and torn evening clothes and blood-soaked shirt and crossed the lobby at a dead run to intercept him.

“You can’t come in here looking like that.”

“Bell. Van Dorn Agency. Take me to the tailor. And round up a haberdasher, a shoe-shine boy, and a barber.”

“Right this way, sir ... Shall I get you a doctor, too?”

“No time.”

The Overland Limited glided into Union Depot forty minutes later.

Isaac Bell was waiting on the platform at the middle of the train, looking far better than he felt. His entire body ached and his ribs hurt with every breath. But he was groomed, shaved, and dressed as well as he had been at the poker game the night before, in crisp black evening clothes, snow-white shirt, silk bow tie and cummerbund, and boots shined like mirrors.

A smile played across his swollen lips. Someone on this train was in for a big surprise. The question was would the Wrecker be so shocked that he gave himself away?

Before the train stopped rolling, Bell stepped aboard the Pullman just ahead of the dining car, pulled himself painfully up the steps, crossed to the dining car, and sauntered in. Forcing himself to stand and walk normally for the benefit of all watching, he asked the steward for a table in the middle, which allowed him to see who entered from either end.

Last night’s thousand-dollar tip in the observation car had not gone unnoticed by the train crew. He was seated immediately and brought hot coffee, steaming breakfast rolls, and a warm recommendation to order the freshly caught Wyoming cutthroat trout.

Bell had watched every man’s face as he had come into the dining car to gauge reactions to his presence. Several, noting his evening attire, remarked with a clubby smile, “Long night?” The Chicago meatpacker gave him a friendly wave, as did the well-dressed drummer he had spoken with in the washroom.

Judge Congdon wandered in, and said, “Forgive me if I don’t join you, Mr. Bell. With the obvious exception of a young lady’s company, I prefer my own in the morning.”

Kenny Bloom staggered into the diner with a hangover clouding his eyes and sat beside Bell.

“Good morning,” said Bell.

“What the hell is good about it ... Say, what happened to your face?”

“Cut myself shaving.”

“George! George! Coffee over here before a man dies.”

Bruce Payne, the oil lawyer, hurried up to their table, talking a blue streak about what he had read in